onepassingnight | Adventure Classic: Dungeon Crawling

Cortana had gotten to her feet only to be overrun once-more by the beasts. She rolled out of the way as they aimed to step on her, blue eyes looking upward trying to find her staff in the dust storm those trampling feet were making. She knew better, how had she gotten in this position? The only reasoning behind it was that they were, in fact, targeting her. Specifically.

"Chief!" She exclaimed, trying to crawl out of the heap as a hand came up and gripped the back of her cloak. She tried blasting whatever it was away only to dropped and picked up by another. She felt herself leave the floor and before she knew it a baton came crashing at the back of her head making her limp in whatever lap she found herself in. "I-It was a trap chief...."

Unconscious or not, it only left someone to blame.

She was prepared to listen, if there was truly no way to save Cortana. She was prepared to let Kanda pull her back to safety. It may have been unacceptable to lose a member, but it was less acceptable still for their entire journey and mission to end in failure. She knew that. She tried, for an instant, to believe that must have been what this was about.

She was prepared to listen, but she was not prepared for what she saw. Her warning came too late, as Cortana already felt the brunt of the plot against them.

"Traitor!" The worst scourge of any battlefield, and the most despised. No one who heard it would hesitate to plunge a weapon into the heart of the man it described. She spat the word as she drew up in anger - but all her struggling and lashing out with heel and elbow weren't enough to overpower Kanda's grip, and she was too beyond herself to notice it kept her from any danger from the creatures he'd summoned.

Even now, she couldn't imagine the true depth of it. She could only think of a thousand things that took on new and grotesque meaning. Each time she found her eyes looking for him had just been his calculation. Every moment of learning to rely on him had made her a fool. She made it personal. She was overwhelmed with shame and the sense he'd been laughing behind her back. Every smile of his was false, every touch- No, she wouldn't think about that.

She would think about vengeance.

His mind flashes with a similar scream in his waking reality. A god-like figure in armor that shaped itself, Cortana looking forlorn at him, and a terminal--

"Cortana!"

He wishes to run after her, without his team, but his mind immediately comes together when he knows he won't catch up with them without another of their animals. He could only see his closest companion held away by these monsters.

And he turns to Kanda.

He jolts towards the traitor with his shield up front, wanting to bash up on the floor and stab his throat, then cut him while he laid on the floor--

But he holds Ami first.

There are no words, no promises to let him live through an interrogation, or warnings that he would kill him if he hurt her. That man was a threat now, and didn't deserve to even receive a word. He would subdue him in any way he could, and that if he hurt Ami he would destroy him without any hesitation.

She is the only reason he doesn't kill him then and there.

Kanda's idea had worked. He had hoped using Ami as a target would have halted Chief's wrath. He wasn't sure how much time he had but he wasn't going to let them attack him, not until he said what he had to say.

"Look, hear me out." He started, bringing his sword to Ami's neck pressing it gently lest she move out of his grip and he lose his flesh shield. "You're right, I sold her out. Truth be told, I've sold you both out. That place you're looking for doesn't exist. This was all a plot to kill the priestess and believe me when I say I don't want that but Cortana had to be taken."

She had to be sacrificed, that was the plan. Had she not fallen then Metallia would have figured it out and they wouldn't be able to destroy her.

Her mind kept replaying everything that ever happened between her and Kanda in this new and horrible light. He hadn't been gentle with her in their stolen nights; she'd taken it for eagerness and passion and desire. She'd liked it, thrilled to it. Now, it seemed like deliberate cruelty, a wish to do no more than to hurt her, perhaps hatred.

And she had been so stupid as to allow it all, to believe in it all. The thought burned. She gripped the anger instead to keep herself moving. She had to find a way to free herself. This was not the time to be sidetracked by feeling. (Any longer.)

Some instinct made her wish to freeze his very hands, bite them with cold and frost, to force him to let her go; but she was no mage, here. She was a priestess. She forced herself to concentrate on his words, to check them against likely falsehood and likely truth.

He has no reason to confess now. He could have escaped with the others instead. Even if he were forgiven, he could never expect enough trust to lead them into a further trap again. There was no strategic point in staying. Perhaps he was speaking the truth. Perhaps.

"I've heard you." The words were brief, harsh, and to the point as she narrowed her eyes and her jaw tightened. "Let me go and I'll hear the rest."

He ignores his offers for information. He was an enemy. For Kanda, Mercury was the only reason he was alive right now. He had sworn to protect her, and any way he hurt her would also mean John would take revenge on him.

It is only her word that guarantees his survival. Until she chooses otherwise.

He stays silent, his shield and blade following Kanda's head with an eerie precision. If Mercury bolted away the second the enemy freed her, that would mean there would be no reason to leave him free, let alone alive.

Kanda gave a light sarcastic chuckle at the priestess's words. Let her go? As if he were that foolish to indulge her when she ran around with that brute of a knight. He gripped her tighter against him, his sword pressing a little firmer. Had she noticed, the blade was reversed. The sharp end wasn't clicing at her throat at all.

"Order him to stand down, priestess. Order him. If you want to save Cortana you're going to have to listen to me. We need her in order to kill Metallia."

If she noticed the sword's position, she also knew how quickly it could be turned. She had no choice but to comply - but John, of course, would know how forced it was. They would figure out something, some plan, that would let them-

Then she realized what he was saying. Kill Metalia??

He was speaking heresy. There were many gods worshiped in this world, and even as a priestess, she had accepted her traveling companions without deeply questioning their personal beliefs so long as they were willing to do Metalia this service. But this could not be ignored or waved away.

First, she had to be free to act. "Stand down," she told John briefly. She knew very well that he was deadly even without his weapon, and would still look for any opportunity to regain the advantage against Kanda.

To Kanda, she demanded the answer to the obvious question: "What are you saying?" How deep did this go? And why did the fact he connected it to Cortana's fate make her feel wary?

Kanda had already turned into an enemy the moment he betrayed them. His treason to gods falls into deaf ears when he mentions his intentions to kill Metalia, instead focusing still on his head to cut for all he did.

And yet he lowers his sword by Mercury's command. But not his shield nor his caution.

There is still a question lingering on his mind, that his body already spoke volumes on a single matter: Cortana. They had to get her back.

Kanda was expecting their reaction, perhaps the priestess would understand the implied contradictions in his words as he made it a point to continue his explanation. He didn't let go of Ami, at first. Not until most of his speech was out with. John was still a hazard.

"The energy you're searching for, there's a reason why it was concentrated at one spot. Metalia exists and she's plotting against this world. I know because I have been her servant long enough to know of her schemes.She wishes to engulf the world in darkness but by doing so, she has to expend a lot of energy. She's ordered her servants to steal it from the masses, the lives of the innocent, and when she heard about the power the priestess held she sent me to capture her and bring you to her in order for her to take whatever energy you had in store."

The blade that was pressing against Ami's neck was removed and with a smooth motion, he sheathed it, bringing himself backwards and onto a knee as he held his hands up in the air. John couldn't attack a surrendering enemy, now could he?

"My intentions before were to follow my commands but I can't. I can't do that anymore."

His tone was that of frustration. He was the best at what he did, the favored rogue of Metalia herself. Kanda had gone willingly to the queen of darkness and hadn't asked for anything, no power. All he wanted was for the queen to keep her promise about destroying the world, he wanted to see it burn. At least, that's how it used to be until the priestess came into his life. Although he still hated the world rather heavily, he didn't hate it as much to agree with Metalia anymore. She had to be destroyed.

"Cortana is still alive, she won't consume her energy until she has captured you two as well. She needs all the energy she can get in order to defeat the priestess and I need you to help me kill her. She had to be captured or else... or else Metalia would know that I was defying her orders. I have never failed a mission. She would be suspicious."

She scrambled away the very moment he freed her, and her order to John was simple in her anger: "Take him."

Take, not kill. She wanted him held while she finished deciding her next move. She would leave him alive; she had a use for him now. At the very least, he knew things they would need in order to find Cortana, if any of his story was true - and his betrayal, at least, was certainly true.

The rest couldn't be. Metalia existed, yes, but Metalia was simply the source and fount of their power. That Metalia needed energy was, of course, true; but to find it this way? (Yet, a cautious inner voice prompts her, a mage like Cortana, and a priestess, would certainly provide great quantities.)

She thought quickly.

"Undo what you've done," she decided. Her eyes flickered to John, who was the most interested in this, then back to Kanda. "Our first concern is this: Return the mage Cortana."

She has an idea about this already. "Go to them," she said. "Tell them you couldn't stay with us now that your intentions were revealed. However, you were able to find out our plans for freeing her." The rest was obvious: He would give them false information, driving them to exactly where she would be making her move. And at the proper time, he would help them, his traveling companions. (And at the proper time, a voice she shouldn't listen to reminded her, she would see for herself what the truth was about Metalia.)

Her orders to the knight were next. She did not bother keeping them secret; let Kanda know the consequences he faces. Perhaps fear would keep him loyal where so-called love did not. "From now on, if he makes one misstep," she told John as she deliberately shut her mind to any softness, "Kill him."

Edited 2013-03-28 21:29 (UTC)

He did not kill surrendering enemies. That is the code of the knight. But by Ami's order, he restrains him to listen to him as soon as she gives it. In spite of everything he felt -what every instinct dictated him to do-, he let him speak. Even the things of Metalia.

And when Mercury tells him their first concern, he lowers his head. Even if she hadn't given the order, he would have come for her.

When Ami gives him the following orders, of killing Kanda the second he so much as hinted about betraying their group yet again, he slowly nods. He is only to let him go if Mercury orders him so. Committing unnecessary cruelty was unbecoming, fitting more of barbarians than of knights.

And yet, this threat hurt Cortana.

Kanda couldn't help but grin. So he had kept the big beast at bay. Perfect. He turned to the priestess and offered her a grin herself. He turned to look at John, the grip he had on him was tight. He could live with this, he was probably going to be under his sights for the rest of the trip. Not a bad thing.

"You won't be disappointed. After all, Metalia is planning on destroying the world. That wouldn't be good for anyone now would it?'

A grin. Of anything she might have expected - fighting back, angry words, even taunting words, or perhaps a daring escape attempt, or a request or demand for freedom - she hadn't expected that. She hadn't expected the grin that said so plainly that none of it touched him at all, that while her mind felt ready to split in two from the effort of keeping her outward composure, his was calm and unaffected.

"Your blasphemy is foul."

She squared her shoulders. This must be done. Mercury stepped around behind Kanda, and her dagger glinted as she drew it again. She nodded to John, a signal to hold their prisoner tightly indeed for what she was about to do to him. She was glad she was behind him; if he could have seen her eyes in that moment- They narrowed, and hardened.

"This will give your story credibility." Without further warning, crimson streaked his back as the dagger lashed it. The wounds were shallow enough not be dangerous, deep enough to plausible.

She had no idea if she'd done it as punishment for his remarks about Metalia, for the sake of her current plan, or because of the sudden driving need to hurt him, to show she could, to show that she wasn't hurt because she would deal the hurt instead and substitute vengeance for regret and pain.

Unbidden, she remembered the scrape of her fingernails against that same skin, a memory as hated now as it had been enjoyed then. She struck once more to strike it from her mind.

Edited 2013-03-30 14:37 (UTC)

In the second Ami nods to the knight, he moves a foot around Kanda's leg to break his stance and holds him by his torso and arm, to forbid him from fighting. For a second, he expected the Priestess' patience to have worn thin and chose to execute him, but he listens.

And watches dispassionately the injury inflicted over the traitor.

It would not be mortal. At most, some thoracic muscles could have been damaged, but they would be enough to keep the guise high. Turning again to see Mercury, however, made him wonder if there was a lot more in her actions than a tactical need.

Only by her order would she release Kanda.

Her slices stung, his back gave several violent spasms as he doubled over. He hadn't been expecting her to do something like this but he figured he deserved it. A few nights of passion and a serious betrayal could definitely leave a woman scorned. He still couldn't help but grin.

"Now that's a different side of you I never thought I would see, priestess." He panted. Shit, his back was sore.

It took all her self-control not to be goaded by that grin. She had hoped to wipe it off him with this and yet- (And yet he dared to act as if she couldn't do anything to him. Maybe he was right.)

"Before you are released," she shouldn't ask this, it shouldn't matter, it can change nothing and in a matter of minutes he will be riding either to betray her again or to clear himself but it can't be like before, "I want to know: Why did you betray us?"

She says 'us' when she really means 'me', but the cover is good enough to get her answer without complete exposing herself, she thinks.

Edited 2013-03-31 02:20 (UTC)

From inside his helm, John's eyes turn to Ami as she asks the question. He was aware of when were some actions more for the unity and welfare of a group, and when was it for personal reasons. He knew Ami's reasons.

This was much more personal. His helm slightly moves in turn to see Ami, but he tightens his hold over Kanda as a warning.

The rogue gave a grunt at the tightening grip from the brute knight before turning his gaze on the priestess. He was well aware of the implication she was offering him to answer but he wouldn't indulge her. That subject was one he wouldn't touch until the deed was done.

"Metalia found me. Years ago. The life of a rogue is simple: take odd job to eat and keep moving. When I met her, I shared the same vision, I wanted the world to burn. She promised me if I helped her that she would make it real, that's exactly what she wanted to do: consume the world in darkness and death."

He wasn't going to explain the why's behind his hatred of the world, that was none of their business. His gaze eventually moved back to the ground.

"It's taken Metalia a long time to get as much energy as she has now and she believes that the priestess will provide the last bit of energy to consume the world. You three were just a job for me. You weren't the first I deceived, the first I led to their deaths, and I thought this would be a job like the others.... but it's not. I don't want the world to burn anymore, the only way to stop her is by killing her."

The priestess was not the first the rogue had deceived. She, who considered herself so far above the foibles and foolishness of others, had fallen into the same trap as - how many? Numerous, she supposed.

She had hated her enemies. She had turned quickly from love to hate; they were so close anyway, in her. But she'd never hated the world she lived in or wanted its end. She didn't even understand the depth of that anger, whatever she might claim and whatever she might do to try to prove what she called strength.

He had changed his mind about that, too, he claimed. It all sounded sincere. It even sounded plausible. But she'd been fooled once. She let the words hang in the air, she gave no indication of whether they were believed, but they were an answer. And if there was any sincerity in those words, he would soon prove it by his actions. She would be watching to see what he did. She wasn't fooling herself into believing he wouldn't have a chance of escape instead.

There might be no one else in the world she'd have given even that much opportunity to.

"Release him," she told John. They were losing valuable time - her own fault, and she inwardly berated herself for the indulgence. "Let him go."

"Rogue. We'll meet as planned." She didn't even speak his name, now. She barely looked at him, as if they were already finished with each other. Her expression was distant, cold.

As soon as he left, she would be making her plans with the knight. They would be prepared for the possibility of the rogue's next betrayal. And one way or another, they would regain Cortana and complete their goals. That was what she should think about now.

Edited 2013-03-31 14:27 (UTC)

The admission that he had betrayed a lot more teams than he expected is strange -- and it makes John even more hesitant to let him go. Even though he was a prisoner, this being deserved to rot in some prison without a single way out, constantly on watch, and on death row. Had he chose to remain fighting, end him...

... And turns to Ami with the order to release him. After a second, he obeys, almost pushing him, showing his back to tell him he is not afraid of him. If he is waiting to trap them, he will destroy everything in their path. That is the fate of his enemies.

As Ami and John walk together, the focus on Cortana continues to linger on his mind. The thought that she is in danger - and that freeing their prisoner could increase it.

"Why did you let him go?"

Kanda didn't normally allow others to kick him around but John was an exception. He knew what the man was capable of and quite personally, he wasn't to getting himself ripped apart because of it. He let him push him gritting his teeth as he left, injured and hurt.

He'd go to Metalia, he'd give her the sob story Ami expected, and he would play his role perfectly. He only hoped the other two didn't screw up. Metalia wasn't exactly some normal woman, they had to be very careful.

She doesn't know herself, why. No words come to her mind to shape themselves into the right form and order to make a good excuse. She can argue all she wants about practical reasons, but a part of her knows those weren't her real ones.

It was him. Something in her just hadn't been able to seek the worst punishment after all, if it was to Kanda. And she knows that was ridiculous. It was not merciful, or kind; it was soft and foolish and dangerous.

"He knows more about what's coming next. He's the best information to still find the mage." She doesn't call Cortana by name. "And..."

If John thinks an admission of her feelings will come next, he's about to be disappointed. "I just want to see what he'll do."

It's not as simple as that, of course. She's watching to see what he betrayed - and stayed loyal to.

The knight slowly turns to Mercury. Their rogue was indeed the best information to find Cortana, and he would have known better about what they would face. But they could barely trust him now, and the only way to feasibly make him help was by keeping him close.

"You just let a traitor go."

It's a warning. Traitors were the lowest of the low. Even knightly law was hardly merciful upon them. Someone that was willing to sell out their own side...

Adventure Classic: Dungeon Crawling

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/COUGH COUGH NO THERE IS NO HUGE GAP HERE...

I see no gap 8D /john yer up

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